How old is he? Also known as Premium Red
by Bomberguy789
Summary: This will be split into two parts. Part 1 is set just before season 15, when Carolina and Wash find out just how old really Sarge is, and Part 2 is when Sarge, after returning to his prime, challenges both Tex AND the Meta to a spar. Want to know how? Simmons is more than willing to explain.


**This is little more than a joke fiction that just randomly popped into my head one time, so don't bother expecting much. As the summary probably says, we all know that Sarge is old, and that's why he acts so crazy all the time. So I figured "eh, why not?" and decided to make this. It will be split into two parts – part one is Carolina and Wash finding out his true age (which I've made up by the way) and in part two, after a series of events that Simmons will explain in detail, Sarge re-enters his prime age and proceeds to smack down on a bunch of Freelancers. Set after season 15.**

* * *

 **Part 1 - He's how old?!**

"You're kidding me."

"Nope."

"There is absolutely no way that can POSSIBLY be true."

"It is. Simmons can back me up if you don't believe me."

"What's this about?"

It was just another day on a remote moon-planet-thingy as the Reds and Blues spent their retirement doing the same things they always did – annoying the hell out of each other. Sarge had been trying to whip the reds into fighting shape so they could finally defeat the "evil blue-armoured devils" once and for all, proving red superiority above everything else.

It went about as well as one might expect, and as Sarge began to recount what war meant to the human race back in his day, Carolina became curious and asked Grif how old Sarge actually was.

The answer was more than a little surprising.

"Grif honestly expects me to believe Sarge is 104 years old."

"Seriously?" said Wash, raising an eyebrow (not that anyone could see it, but when you've worn a helmet for as long as these soldiers have you get better at making your feelings obvious in your voice). "He doesn't exactly look old."

"Well duh. How can anyone look like anything when you can't see ANY part of anyone? Hell, me and Tucker used to argue for ages about whether or not Tex was hotter than-" Grif suddenly stopped.

"Go on?" growled Carolina, pure venom practically dripping from her voice. Grif wisely chose to change subject.

"Anyway, to make this short, it turned out Tex was blonde and NOT a brunette or a black-haired hottie."

"Okay, I can see what you're saying but..." glancing at Sarge as he let out a war cry and rushed over to the Warthog, a reluctant Lopez and annoyed Simmons following him while Donut provided "cover fire" with his surprisingly good grenade-throwing, Carolina shook her head in disbelief. "There is NO WAY he can be that old and still want to get up and move as early as he does."

An explosion rocked the earth (not THE Earth, just – you know what, forget it, you understand what I'm talking about) as a mistimed grenade blew the warthog to pieces, throwing Simons ("I knew this was a bad idea!") and Lopez ("Dios maldito.") clear across their new base while Sarge ploughed across the field only to slide to a stop at Wash's feet.

As it became clear Sarge had damaged his helmet, it fell off once the safety latches failed to work, revealing-

"No way..."gasped Wash, his mind unable to compute the wrinkled, baggy face in front of him with the masked, grumpy red-helmeted man he thought he knew.

"Wash; tell me you're seeing what I see."

"I see it... at least, I think I see it. Caboose wasn't put in charge of breakfast was he?"

"No, it was my turn." Wash, in a moment of pure wisdom and enlightenment, decided not to mention that she wasn't much better. Having only bothered to learn to cook basic rations, Agent Carolina was... less than perfect when it came to cooking. Or singing. Or really anything that wasn't to do with fighting, although if you mentioned that she would almost definitely bring you closer to death than you necessarily wanted to be.

"But that means-"

"Grif!" Sarge stood up and pulled his helmet in to place, before seeing Carolina and Wash and readying his trusty shotgun. "What in Sam-hell are you doing conversing with the enemy! Those dirty blues are finally going to be driven out of this planet for good, and we will be able to use their equipment to wage bloody warfare on every civilisation in the known galaxy! Then the unknown. Then the known enemies the unknown enemies know. Then the unknown enemies our unknown enemies don't know about. Then-"

"Yeah, I'm going to stop you right there Sarge," Interrupted the lazy orange sim-trooper. "See, there's this little thing called retirement, and it's supposed to be something to enjoy. So I'm going to enjoy my retirement by NOT doing whatever you tell me to do. Just think of it as if I'm on break."

"But you were always on break!"

"Exactly! You're getting it already."

Sarge growled in anger at his disloyal subordinate before lowering his shotgun, glaring at the two freelancers. "You may think that you've won, but make no mistake. Once I have rebuilt my army-"

"Lopez's repair manual is in the blue base."

"Dangit! I thought I ordered Simmons to store it in our base!"

"Well yeah, but Caboose needed it to cook his breakfast."

"But how can you possibly use a robot-repair manual to cook food?" questioned Wash.

"Hey, don't look at me; I don't understand Simmons's weird nerdy shit, OR Caboose's style of cooking."

Carolina tuned out the ongoing argument as part of her defence mechanism against the stupidity that Wash was letting himself become a part of. Honestly, what were they even talking about again?

* * *

 **Part 2 - Sarge vs Tex and the Meta**

"So, to put it simply, after a strange series of events that would take too long for me to ever explain again, Sarge is now 26 years old."

Tucker let out an appreciative whistle. "Damn, that sure did explain everything clearly. I would hate to just walk in here without knowing any context whatsoever."

"Yeah. Remember that time when Donut told Church that the reason Tex and Carolina were trying to find and kill him was because he said "neither of their holes were tight enough" and that he thought "Caboose was hotter?"

"Oh man, Church wouldn't believe it for weeks! I still remember him trying to get Wash to tell him it wasn't true!"

"Yep. Context sure makes one hell of a difference. Now come on, you said the fight was happening in like, five minutes right? I want to be there when Tex and the Meta beat down Sarge's ego." And together, Tucker and Simmons ran off to join up with the other Reds and Blues.

 ** _In the training arena used during Project Freelancer_**

Tex was stretching out her limbs as Meta checked that all of the various components for his grenade launcher ("I'd better get the Grifshot back," mumbled Grif) were in place, before loading in the ammo and sharpening the blade one final time with the provided whetstone. Checking the sights on her magnum, Tex spared a glance towards Sarge as he casually sat on his own ammunition-providing column, despite the fact that it still had ammo on it.

"Have you two ladies finished your lollygagging yet, or do you need to check that your bladders are empty before you embarrass yourselves?" Tex glared at Sarge from beneath her helmet, while Meta's glowered so fiercely that if looks could kill, I would have to try really hard not to use the obvious cliche endings to that phrase.

"By the time I'm done with you, Red team is gonna need a mop to clean the remains."

Meta growled in that weird way of his.

"By the time _I'm_ done with _you,_ Meta's gonna be shaking in those pearly white boots of his so hard, he'll break his own knees."

"Oh snap!" cried Church in the viewing room, in his new body that I would explain, but that would just mean you didn't listen to Simmons when he explained it the first time.

"Yeah, suck it Tex! And Meta!" Tex and Meta simultaneous glared at Simmons. "Don't hurt me!" Simmons murmured in fear.

"Are all combatants ready?" Sarge stood up from his podium as it sunk into the floor, while Tex and Meta removed the safeties from their weapons and loaded them, taking their combat stances. "The fight will begin in 3..."

Sarge smirked beneath his helmet. "To those girls on the blue team," Sarge pumped his shotgun. "Prepare to get a taste of what you should thank your lucky stars you never had to face."

"2..."

"Try not to kill him too hard!" called Wash from the viewing room, exchanging a nervous glance with agent York and agent Iowa (Simmons already explained this). They all knew how dangerous Tex and the Meta could be by themselves, but working together, WITH their AI, AND on the basis that if they lose they have to wear french maid outfits for a WEEK, while if they win then they get the right to force the whole of Red team to shut up whenever they wanted (because believe me, they didn't want to hear a single word from those idiots)...

Well, being younger and all, maybe Sarge wouldn't get hurt _too_ badly, right?

Wash could dream.

"1... begin!"

Immediately Meta rushed in, blade sweeping in a horizontal arc that would have decapitated Sarge's head. Would have, had he not ducked and unleashed a shotgun blast in the Meta's face from point blank range before using the Meta's momentum to roll backwards and kick him to the wall behind him. Upon the failure of the Meta's attack - something that Tex really hadn't expected Sarge to survive - Tex aimed her magnum at the vital parts of Sarges body and fired repeatedly, forcing Sarge to roll to the side before, attempting to rush Tex to increase the effectiveness of his shotgun.

As he entered firing range Sarge fired, forcing Tex to move from her position lest she receive the same treatment as the Meta had. Not wanting to lose the opportunity to beat down one of the annoying Reds with her own fists, Tex holstered her weapon before lunging at Sarge with an overhead axe-kick. Sarge blocked it with his weapon, pushing Tex off and attempting to fire at her only for Tex to kick at his weapon, forcing him to hold onto it with one hand lest he lose it.

Unwilling to let him ready himself, Tex leapt forwards, starting off a vicious assault with a right hook before unleashing a barrage of jabs, kicks and feints. Sarge kept up with the pace, blocking the majority of the incoming hits and recovering quickly from the few that made it through. It culminated to when Sarge made to jump over a sweeping leg only for it to turn out to be a feint, with Tex's foot burying itself in his gut and launching him to the opposing wall.

Sarge hit the wall hard, earning gasps of shock from the growing crowd in the observation deck. Tex was going all out, but Sarge had still lasted almost as long as Carolina did way back before the fall of Freelancer. That in itself was an impressive feat.

So imagine their surprise when Sarge pulled himself to his feet, chuckling in amusement. "Is that the best you've got?" Tex's eyes narrowed beneath her helmet. He was much stronger and faster than when she had fought (fought, pummeled, it's all just semantics really) him way back in season, and clearly he had the endurance to match. This might take longer than she thought. "Now, usually I wouldn't want to hit a girl, but that little tooth-fairy friend of yours convinced me that he wasn't gay. Therefore, I have come to the conclusion that I must have gotten something wrong during my many top secret scouting and information gathering missions on the blues!"

"Top secret?!" shouted Tucker from above. "You would stand on a hill and shout insults at us for the whole day!"

"But of course! It was the most satisfying distraction that anyone could possibly conceive of! Because while I distracted you from the front, Donut and Lopez would sneak to the back and gather intel from right under your nose!"

"Yeah!" exclaimed Donut, "I always was good at taking things from behind!"

"But back to the point at hand, I realised that the tiny blue wasn't gay. So, I came to the only logical conclusion about who you are, agent Texas. You must be a man! Which means," Sarge grinned beneath his helmet, pumping his shotgun for effect, "that once I've beaten you, you're going to have to pretend to be a girl for a whole week instead of ACTUALLY being a girl! So how about we stop holding back and start fighting for real?"

"Tch. Still as stupid as ever," grumbled Tex.

The Meta took this as his cue to reenter the fray, deactivating his invisibility cloak (woah, did we just have a harry potter crossover reference in a show about soldiers in space doing nothing of importance?) and smashing Sarge with his blade. Sarge flew forward, but as Tex prepared to beat him down into the ground, he orientated himself and, instead of getting smashed by Tex, smashed _into_ Tex, before leaping off of her body to fly back towards Meta.

Unprepared, the Meta tried to fire his grenades, only for Sarge to twist his body out of harms way while still midair, firing his shotgun - once again - at point blank range into the Meta's face.

Meanwhile, from up above, the real Allison Church watched her AI counterpart's fierce exchange with the red idiot who should have accepted retirement. She smirked. "He always did forget about my best moves..."

The shotgun pellets whistled- no wait, that's too cliche - roared past Tex's face as she yet again narrowly dodged what may very well bring an end to the fight. In response, she threw a terrifyingly strong haymaker, one which Sarge wasn't quite able to dodge, instead receiving only a glancing blow that still managed to send him spinning. Using this spin however, he planted his feet before whipping his trusty shotgun towards Tex's chest, knocking her to the side before using the last of his momentum to turn fully to the white giant behind him shooting him - and yes, this IS a recurring theme - at point blank, in the face.

This time however, the Meta refused to let that faze him. In the milisecond between the pellets leaving the shotgun and the pellets hitting him in the face, Meta activated his time distortion.

Time slowed to a standstill. Sound vanished without a trace. And the Meta? Oh, he was going to enjoy this.

First, he punched Sarge square in the jaw. Then he smashed him in the visor. Then he continued to pummel him, again and again beating him until his suit warned him that time would soon be continuing at the same rate. He stepped back to watch his handiwork.

The shotgun pellets from earlier slammed into his face, enraging him as the AI in his head screamed at themselves for forgetting about such an important fact.

* * *

"He'll live," spoke Doc, holding an ACTUAL medical scanner in his hands instead of his usual alien pistol. "He's probably going to need some medical attention though. Does anyone know a doctor? As in, one with actual medical training?" Wash sighed in annoyance.

"I know one who's willing to do what I say, but I'm not sure what he'll think about-"

"Dude, I'm kidding! Jeez, I forgot that you weren't there when my split personality became the greatest surgeon in the galaxy. _Maybe if those wimps continued to let me attmpt more ADVENTUROUS areas of research, I wouldn't have needed to come back here!"_

"That's what happened? You said you were looking for presents!" Said Caboose.

"I told you, the presence of a pulse doesn't mean it's Christmas!"

"If it's not Christmas, then- wait... is it someone's birthday? Whose is it? Oh I'm so sorry Tucker, I didn't get you anything!"

It was at this moment that agent Carolina burst through the doors, running at breakneck pace before stumbling to a stop, her weapon out and analysing all possible threats.

"Guys what's going on, I picked up your signal when you got away from the Flood and- wait, York?! Church?! Meta?! What the hell is going on here?!"

Everyone looked between each other, wondering how best to explain. "Whose turn was it again?"

"It's Tucker's!"

"Is it? Aw man, this's going to take ages!" Signing in annoyance, Tucker pulled out his blood red plasma axe. "So, it alol started when Sister asked why we were here."

* * *

 **And there you have it! This weird brainchild of mine that popped up when I rewatched season 15. Of course, both of these stories are entirely canon, and would have been the perfect setup for season 16, 17, 18 and 19. I hope you enjoyed reading it, because I think that it was pretty fun to create. If you are one of those guys who follows my stories, then I would like to say that I am working on the next chapter Shopping vibes and already have the majority of it planned and written. If you wish to have an idea of what's coming, then it involves Ruby. If you aren't interested in that whatsoever, then have a nice day, cutting a net lowers the number of holes, and everything in the universe is either a potato or not a potato.**


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